It's a Merry Season
by Monica Tailor
Summary: The winters in Ketterdam are cold and dreary, but the Dregs always find a way to keep their spirits up. (Or: a collection of SoC Christmas oneshots, originally posted on ao3, wherein Jesper is a snowball maniac and Kaz has a No Good Very Bad Christmas - with a happy ending.)
1. Chapter 1: Snowballs

Author's Note: These oneshots are not set at any specific points within the canon timeline. The next one is probably pre-Six-of -Crows-ish and this one would be post-Crooked-Kingdom-ish (except Matthias lives because he deserves to dammit).

That's all from me folks. Enjoy :D

* * *

"Give it up Jesper!" yells Nina.

"It's six to one, you're surrounded!" adds Matthias, crouched by her side behind a stack of empty crates.

Jesper grins and readies his ammunition. "Try me, dimwits!"

The first courageous Dreg peeks out from behind an old hole-ridden barrel. Jesper's ball strikes her before she even has a chance to take aim. The two Dregs hiding by the front stairs see it as their chance to attack him while he's distracted, and they both fall to the ground plastered with a flurry of snow projectiles. The last of the Dregs takes a single look at his hapless companions and runs back inside the Slat yelling "I give up! I give up!"

Jesper laughs at that. "See Nina? Your armies bow to me!"

A snowball whizzes by his ear in response. He hides behind his own crate pile, snickering. Oh, what a pity Ketterdam gets only a few days of snow each year, and what a pity almost no one wants to help him make use of it. He tried to ask Wylan first, but the boy merely said he had some new blueprints to discuss with Raske and vanished through the front door of the Slat. Nina and Matthias came by next, and luckily they were much easier to convince – sure they scoffed at his childish ideas at first, but once he threw a few snowballs at them they were very quick to drop their mature façade. It was a matter of minutes before both sides had their own crate fort, and then Nina persuaded a few other Dregs to join her and Matthias' side, and now here they are.

Jesper leans out again, ready to immediately duck back down to avoid another one of Nina's snowballs (Saints, she's a frighteningly accurate shot when she's pissed). But, to his surprise, none come. He can hear Nina and Matthias exchange a few hushed words behind the safety of their barricade. A moment later, he sees Nina sprint out of their hiding place and hop behind the hole-ridden barrel with a devious glint in her eyes. Matthias stays behind cover, watching Jesper's crate fort like a hawk. It takes Jesper a split second to understand there's been a change in tactics; his friends have apparently realized that they're going to need more than snowballs to take him down, and that Jesper is almost within range of Nina's powers. Just a few steps closer and he's done for.

Jesper feels the rush of adrenaline kick in, and when Nina tries to close in on him again, he flings a single snowball at her and dodges Matthias' retaliatory shot. Nina skids to a halt to avoid Jesper's snowball, but it still hits its mark and knocks her hat off - just as Jesper intended.

He definitely _did not_ intend for her to then lose her footing and land face-first in a snowbank, though he'd admit the look of outraged shock she gives him just before she falls is rather magnificent.

He doesn't have much time to savor it - once Matthias sees what Jesper did to Nina, he jumps over the crates with a roar and charges at Jesper, an enormous clump of snow in hand, probably planning to cram it down Jesper's throat, but he makes it barely five steps before he slips on the same ice as Nina and lands on his tush on the sleety pavement before Jesper can so much as raise another snowball, his breath momentarily knocked out.

Jesper's blood is still pumping wildly when he hears footsteps approaching from behind. He whirls around, determined to snipe down whichever unfortunate Dreg chose to swing by at this time, and-

"I wouldn't do that if I were you."

-and _freezes_ , because he just came _this close_ to throwing a snowball in Kaz Brekker's face. Kaz himself, however, seems unperturbed by this fact, imposing as usual in his black coat and gloves, standing in the middle of the street and looking from the petrified Jesper to the seething Nina and befuddled Matthias to the three snow-caked Dregs observing the scene from the sidelines. His gaze is utterly unreadable.

"Hey there," Jesper drawls, going for nonchalance. He's pretty sure Kaz won't give him a hard time for distracting a few of the gang members from their work, but then again, one could never be certain with the Bastard of the Barrel.

Oh well, apologizing probably wouldn't do him any good now anyway. So, Jesper tries a different approach. "Uh, wanna join us? There's plenty of snow to go around." Even on a bad leg day, Kaz would probably make a worthier opponent than Wylan. The boy's aim is decent enough, but it's also awfully obvious that aim doesn't matter much when the things he's throwing explode on impact.

(...Huh. Exploding snowballs. He'll have to talk to Wylan about this one.)

Kaz quirks an eyebrow. "As much as I'd like to join your little game and waste an afternoon of paperwork..." Is that a smirk on Kaz's face or is Jesper just imagining things? "...I'd prefer a quick win."

That's when Jesper feels a sudden yank at the back of his scarf, followed by the unpleasant sensation of something wet and chilly sliding down his spine. He yelps and pivots to grab at whoever dared to jump him and narrowly misses Inej's giggling face.

 _„Not fair!_ " he screams, twisting and scrambling at the handful of slush she's so unceremoniously stuffed down his coat, _„How_ did you manage to sneak up on me on _snow_ , that's not _natural-"_

Nina and Matthias have finally managed to recover, and now they're laughing their asses off at Jesper's pitiful attempts to get the melting mass out of his clothes. His two assailants are standing to the side, looking colossally smug, and Jesper would snowball those cocky grins right off their faces if he didn't have _freezing slush_ under his coat and _oh Saints help him_ it's under his _shirt_ now too-

Wylan and half the Slat come rushing out a moment later, probably alarmed by the noise. Once Wylan sees what the fuss is all about, he heaves a sigh, hauls his shivering boyfriend indoors to the sounds of laughter from everyone assembled and pulls off his scarf, coat and shirt. "I thought the Zemeni hate cold," he says, once Jesper is safely wrapped in a blanket on a chair next to the stove in his room.

"I'm full of surprises,"Jesper waggles his eyebrows. "Wanna know exactly how cold it is outside?"

"Not really, I should probably get back downstairs to-" the rest of Wylan's words turns into a squeal when Jesper pokes him in the side of the neck with a still-cold finger. Jesper ends up chasing him down the hallway as Wylan screams at him to _stop it_ and _you're horrible, you know that?_

He says that, but he still giggles all the way.


	2. Chapter 2: Get-togethers

Author's Note: The All Saints' Day is a festival I made up since I couldn't find any suitable holiday in the Grishaverse to stand in for Christmas :3

* * *

For Kaz Brekker, winter always brings more inconveniences than anything else. This one is no different: there are the slippery streetways; the sparser traffic in the Harbors; the severe leg pains that leave him cranky and bedridden every now and then; the overly cheerful coworkers being excited about the upcoming festivities and telling him to lighten up (Inej, Jesper, Nina and Per Haskell, in order from the least to most annoying).

But those are all just trifles. The truly unbearable part of every winter is the memories. It was late autumn when he and Jordie first came to Ketterdam; it was early winter when Jordie passed. Kaz spent his first All Saints' in Ketterdam alone, curled up into a shivering ball in an abandoned basement. Years later, he still remembers it in vivid detail, the way his cold fingers trembled as he struggled to unlatch the basement window, the way his stomach grumbled, the way he lay there, listening to the people singing in the streets above and hoping no street thugs would find him or his hiding place.

During the day, he's usually busy enough to push the thoughts aside. However, at night, when his damned leg keeps him awake, there are times when he feels not the mattress but cobblestones beneath his back, and a stiff corpse of his brother lying in the dark next to him. When he sleeps, his dreams bring him images of his father's farm covered in snow, of his brother laughing and singing All Saints' carols in front of a fireplace decked with ribbons. Of an unploughed field, strewn with blood and guts. In the morning, he wakes up more exhausted than when he'd gone to sleep.

He knows the restless nights are taking a toll on him, and knows that the others can see it, too; Jesper and Nina make several offhand remarks about the importance of beauty sleep. Haskell tells him to visit a medik and put himself together. Inej comes to him once with a worried look on her face and asks him if everything's alright. He waves them all off. His own mind, however, is not so easy to dismiss.

 _ _It's stupid__ , he tries to tell himself. The past is in the past. No reason to dwell on it more now than any other time of the year. But it's no good: the memories still linger, and the dreams keep coming back to haunt him every time he lays his head on the pillow.

Finally, on one particularly cold night, the thoughts and the constant aching become too much to bear. Kaz climbs out of his bed, grabs his coat and cane, prepares to make his way down the three flights of stairs. He needs to… he's not quite sure what. Walk it off, maybe, trudge through the freezing streets until his legs go numb and he's too tired to dream. Pick a fight or two, if he's lucky.

As he descends the staircase, step by aching step, he can hear the sounds of the Dregs who are playing cards and chattering in one of the larger rooms on the ground floor. He intends to pass by through the darkened foyer and slip out before anyone can spot him. Instead, he makes it three steps to the front door when he freezes in the middle of the hallway, stunned by one of the most horrid sounds he'd ever heard in his entire miserable life:

" _ _Yudlooooooooch-ka! Chot ye v lisu, zielenaaaaaaaaa-__ "

It's Nina's voice. Ear-gratingly pitched and screechy, but definitely hers. Kaz can see her now, through the doorway connecting the room and the foyer: she's seated on a stool in the middle of the room, belting out some Ravkan song Kaz doesn't recognize, and she looks half in her cups at the least.

The rest of the room's occupants must be fully drunk, because not a single one of them tells her to knock it off; worse, a few people join in on the singing, seemingly in good spirits.

That's when Kaz notices the tiny wreaths on the walls, the festively set table by the left wall, the heaps of pastries from what is probably every good bakery in the city. There are several bottles of distilled spirits making their way around the room, and the small stove in the corner of the room holds three steaming teakettles. It's a little alarming that they managed to put together a party like this without his knowledge; though, given how distracted he'd been lately, he shouldn't be that surprised.

It suddenly occurs to him that today must be the All Saints' Day.

Kaz doesn't know how much time goes by as he takes in the whole room. His presence, however, doesn't go unnoticed.

"Kaaaaaaaz, my dear, grouchy friend! Here to join our little celebration?"

It's a very tipsy Jesper, making his way to Kaz through the crowd. Kaz is about ready to bolt when, out the corner of his eye, he spots __Inej__ of all people, sitting in a small circle of chairs with a few other Dregs, as flushed and merry as he'd ever seen her, and the sight leaves him dumbfounded long enough for Jesper to reach his side.

He should leave, tell them he has some business to attend to and leave them to their revelry. Instead, he lets Jesper show him to a chair by the stove. He accepts a cup of spiced tea and a sticky sugared cookie. Once the rest of the Dregs notice he's there (and get over the initial shock over seeing him there at all), he is swamped with joyful greetings and wishes of "merry All Saints', boss!" Kaz doesn't really know what to say to them, but those faces, all so happy to see him, make some withered sentimental part of his heart stir.

In the end, he stays with them the entire night. He doesn't talk much to anyone at first, until Jesper and Keeg rope him into a game of cards. ("But we're only playing for almond cakes! I ain't betting cash with Kaz Brekker at the table.") They play several rounds, though they soon stop keeping track of who's winning. Kaz switches from tea to a bottle of something stronger. Then, encouraged by the drink and the joyful atmosphere, he pulls a few cards out of the packet and makes them appear and disappear to the audience of nearly everyone in the room except for Nina, who has passed out under the table halfway through some old Ravkan folk tune and nobody bothered to wake her up (thank the Saints). Between the card tricks and the bouts of cheery clapping, he barely notices that his leg has gradually stopped hurting.

When he finally gets back into his rooms, head buzzing with warmth and the sound of terrible All Saints' carols, it's already close to dawn. He falls asleep right away, and for once his dreams are easy, free of any past shadows.

* * *

Author's Note: Jordie dying in early winter is not an unsubstantiated headcanon: Kaz's father died while plowing a field, placing the time of his death somewhere in spring. However, Kaz and Jordie got to Ketterdam on a boat carrying produce, implying that they may have stayed on their farm until after harvest in autumn, and they spent about 1-2 months in the city altogether (a few days before they met Filip + 1 week Jordie spent working for Hertzoon + an unspecified amount of time before their first scheme came to fruition + app. 3 weeks and 2 days between that & Jordie and Kaz getting evicted out of their boarding house + 3 days before Jordie and Kaz got firepox and an unspecified amount of time before Jordie died), which would correspond roughly with the beginning of winter.


End file.
